


Walking The Line

by gaywalkers



Category: EastEnders (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Cal loves Ben, Character Study, M/M, deep description of fear and insecurities, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:22:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27874522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaywalkers/pseuds/gaywalkers
Summary: For as long as Callum can remember, fear has lived within his heart. Callum sometimes thinks of the dread that eats at his heart as a dragon. As a child, he believed dragons lived within the sun, feeding the heat, the light.His fear is another kind of dragon; a cold, dead kind.Not nearly dead enough.At night, the dragon sometimes sneaks through the cracks in the walls he has built up within himself, and crawls up into his brain and festers at the inside of his skull. Whispering.-Character study that ends with the current place the police storyline is in. Based on the assumption that Ian dobs Cal in it to Ben to shift blame.
Relationships: Callum "Halfway" Highway/Ben Mitchell
Comments: 3
Kudos: 26





	Walking The Line

The dark is generous and it is patient and it always wins – but in the heart of its strength lies its weakness: one lone star is enough to hold it back. 

It is the dark that seeds cruelty into justice, that drips contempt into compassion, that poisons love with grains of doubt.

The dark’s patience is infinite. Eventually, even stars burn out.

For as long as Callum can remember, fear has lived within his heart. Callum sometimes thinks of the dread that eats at his heart as a dragon. As a child, he believed dragons lived within the sun, feeding the heat, the light. 

His fear is another kind of dragon; a cold, dead kind. 

Not nearly dead enough. 

At night, the dragon sometimes sneaks through the cracks in the walls he has built up within himself, and crawls up into his brain and festers at the inside of his skull. Whispering. 

Callum has been running all his life, from his dad, from his home, from the army, from himself. He can’t stop running. It's built into him like life support. Sometimes he runs in the morning, to freshen his mind - an old army habit, he tells himself. Sometimes he runs in the dead of night, trying to chase the dark sludge in his body away, not knowing that it was the sludge chasing him, catching at his feet, willing him to fall. But running doesn’t change anything. 

It never has. 

The first time he ran away, it was from your generic school bullies. With Callum’s doe-eyed, dopey look to him- he was easy pickings. Callum wasn’t a fighter- he chose not to be. Because to be a fighter would mean he would have to be more like his dad. 

Be more of a man, the dragon would whisper in the depths of his heart. 

He saw where being a fighter got his brother Stuart, he vowed to never end up the same, twisted man his dad had become. But running didn’t stop the bullies, it just delayed the inevitable. Callum wore his heart on his sleeve, and in this cold, cruel world, his heart was not deemed to survive. Maybe fighting wasn’t such a bad idea. 

To kill or to be killed. That’s what the army taught him. 

It's ironic really, that Callum used the army as a means to escape his fathers wrath as early as possible, when the army was just a new way of turning out the way his dragon wanted. Sometimes the dragon’s voice would sound so much like Jonno’s that Callum was convinced he was haunted. Or delusional. The army wanted - needed - a fighter in Callum. Needed him to be a man. 

The army wasn’t really an escape at all, just Callum running round in circles.

Leaving the army was a relief.  _ The nightmares will finally stop. _ Callum had thought. He was wrong. Hailed a hero by his brother, who had been twisted to form new knotts, ones Callum didn’t recognise. Refused to recognise until they had slapped him cold in the face. He didn’t run. There was only one person in the darkness of the universe that understood Callum and that was his brother. 

Until a cocky, brunette man walked into the Vic, bold as brass, introduced himself to Callum Highway. 

_ “Ben Mitchell” _

He knew he needed to run- to stay far away from Ben. People had told stories, when they were ten drinks in and demanding more from Callum standing behind the bar. Callum was told he was not a good person. 

But Callum was never a really good listener. 

Callum was drawn to him like a moth to a flame, despite his best efforts to keep Ben’s presence in his life minimal, he couldn’t seem to manage it. He had first hand experience of Ben sharp-tongued wit, and the threats that rolled with too much ease down his tongue- that alone should have put him off ever be-friending Ben. However, suddenly, like the wind coming and going, Callum was holding a piece of Ben in the palm of his hand, and he knew Ben was holding a piece of him too. They were eerily similar people. Similar stories. And yet so different at the same time. Callum was warm whereas Ben was cold. Callum was all blurred lines and soft curves. Ben was sharp and ridgid. The pair: an oxymoron written in the stars. 

And yet they were drawn to each other all the same. 

Ben saw Callum, the real Callum, when no one else could. 

_ “You see me too.”  _

_ “Why are you so bothered about me?” _

_ “Why’d you think?” _

In the pale moonlight, the shadows of the park- Callum wrestled with his dragon. It was losing. Cheating on Whitney was never the plan, but it's a moment in Callum’s life he's never been able to regret, even in his most fearful closeted moments. Kissing Ben felt right, more right than anything in Callum’s entire life. Littered clothes, deep moans and gasps for breath. 

Those changed everything. 

So Callum did the one thing that was more basic to him than breathing, he ran. 

He let the dragon win. 

For 28 years, Callum tried to reach within himself and rip out the parts his father demanded to break. He reached through his mind to crush the shadow that made him different- but such a task meant taking who he was, and becoming someone entirely new. He would become like a painter gone blind, a composer gone deaf. In the end he cannot touch the shadow. In the end, he doesn’t even want to. Because the shadow understands him, the shadow forgives you, the shadow gathers you up and shows you who you are.

It took meeting Ben for Callum to realise that being different was okay, that it was entirely, completely, wholly, normal. 

_ “I find it hard to be sincere.” _

_ “I find it hard to be anything but.” _

_ “That’s why I like ya.” _

He took his life into his hands, allowed his shadow to gather the broken parts of him and piece them back together, brokenly beautiful, reflecting in pride. 

He took Ben into his hands and kissed him. Stood his ground and did not run. 

The star shone a little brighter that day. 

The Highway brothers have an unspoken agreement. They back each other- despite their grievances. Callum knows Stuart would fight the battles Callum couldn’t and Stuart knows Callum will love him where others did not. Their abusive dad forged a bond between the brothers, despite their differences, that would never be broken. Stuart would protect his little brother- maybe out of love, maybe out of guilt that he wasn’t always there to defend Callum, maybe a sweet, intoxicating mixture of both. 

Callum hoped he had this type of bond with his boyfriend. With Ben. 

_ “But then I stopped… because I didn’t want him to take it out on you.” _

Callum knows from the Keanu ordeal, Ben would do whatever it takes to keep Callum safe; happy; alive. But, despite what people might say, Callum’s no fool. He knows Ben is a Mitchell and always will be. That's what keeps his mouth shut tight most nights. 

When curled around Ben’s sleeping form, the dragon would flick its tail, reminding Callum that he doesn’t deserve this, not after what he’s done. 

Not after Chris. 

The deepest, biggest regret of Callum’s life is never taking that leap of faith with Chris. Shoved so far into the closet he couldn’t even see the edge of the cliff. 

The star would remind him that somewhere, Chris is proud of him- happy for him. 

Callum hopes that’s true. 

Bravery was never really his thing. While those around him considered him brave for dedicating a portion of his life to the army, Callum considered himself nothing more than a coward. 

The thought still rang true to him now, even after he climbed his mental mountains and finally became who he is. Transforming like a butterfly. He never stood up to his father, he didn’t fight on the behalf of his brother like Stuart did for him, he only used the army as a form of escapism- and a reassurance that he was someone who liked to help people. It took Ben for him to realise he’s going to have to have courage for him to break the cycle he was running in. 

The same applies now- but with disastrous consequences that taunt Callum’s every thought. 

It took Callum courage to lay his heart on the line before Ben, it took bravery to keep his heart on that line. But when his life changed again- and it seemed Ben was no longer to be central to it- he ran. 

Cowards are the best runners after all.

He ran and ran until he found he had ran right back into Walford: back into Ben’s place of work, straight into his arms. In inceptu finis est.  _ The end is in the beginning.  _

Hand in hand, Ben and Callum walked the line. Callum had kept his heart on it.

_ A uniform is a uniform _ ; he told Ben once. 

He shouldn’t have been so delusional to think the police would be different to the army. That there wouldn’t be a tyrant that pulled and stamped on his sleeve. Callum believed it would be different because he was different this time. He  _ wasn’t running.  _

Only he was, because no matter how much he changed, he grew. No matter how much he denied it, fought against it, his fathers influence on who he should be was carved into his subconscious like an ugly shrapnel scar. He wants to help people-  _ he knows he does-  _ but there a million other jobs that do that, ones that weren’t the police. Ones that weren’t a uniform, that only fitted those at the top of the hierarchy. But he chose the police, fought for it. And even now, with blackmail hanging over his head like a dark cloud, the pressure weighing him down, lines in his face getting deeper and deeper, the light in his eyes dulling, the purple bruises forming one after another, Callum was still trying to prove he was manly. 

Because admitting out loud that he needed help, that he was in too deep and couldn’t see a way out of a problem entirely of his own making to him, seemed like empirical proof that he wasn’t cut out for being a police man; being  _ a man.  _ But this then made him a coward. He’ll admit it- he is a coward. Can’t stand up to his boss, but refuses to ask to help in fear for what will happen once his betrayal rears its ugly head.

Callum fell into the dragons trap when he unleashed his fury on Danny. Looking back at the blood stained on his white shirt, Callum saw the irony of the situation. And with that, a sharp realisation that he had sunk into his fathers habit. Violence. In truth, on a fundamental basis, Callum does not know what to do when his loved ones are at risk other than fight- it’s the only thing he ever saw his father do. His father, who was supposed to love him, protect him, raise him to be a better person. In a strange way, Phil and Jonno were uncannily alike. 

Ben had finally learnt to trust and love someone on a level that needed no boundaries- and Callum was about to rip that safety net away from him in a cruel twist of fate. He was a hypocrite- preaching honesty to Ben and yet now the shoe was on the other fucking foot now. Maybe he feels a little guilt on the pressure he put on Ben to tell the truth in the past now. 

Callum would never hurt Ben. Not intentionally. Ben was his first, his last and his only choice. Ben was the priority- something Callum knew Ben had never been in his life. He prayed every night that Ben would see Callum did everything he did for Ben. Put his job and his life on the line they walk. But nothing will soften the sting of betrayal- nothing will erase the fact that Callum chose to throw Ben’s dad under the bus. He’s accepted this, and now he’s contemplating running, but that’ll only delay the inevitable.

It always does. Because Callum’s still running in circles. 

Callum’s darkened, stained hands started to spill over to Ben, the secrets creating a rift between them that was spewing darkness. His agony somehow became an invisible hand, stretching out through their bond, a hand that found Ben, far away and yet so close. 

Ben’s trying to save him, save them, because he believes Callum would do the same thing for him. Because he knows Callum would do the same. 

The first dawn of light in his universe brings pain. 

The light burns him. Part of him wakes up laid upon black glass sand beside a lake of fire while flames chew upon his flesh. He can hear himself breathing. It comes hard, and harsh, and it scrapes nerves already raw, but he cannot stop it. He can never stop it.

Two weeks are up and the cards haven’t changed to be in his favour. Callum knows now, that once this is all over, he’ll change. He’ll become a boy who hides his heart. 

He doesn’t dare think about what was supposed to have happened to Keanu. 

Sat alone, in the depths of the dark covering the Mitchell kitchen like a blanket, Callum gathers his courage. 

The dark is generous. Its first gift is concealment: our true faces lie in the dark beneath our skins, our true hearts remain shadowed deeper still. But the greatest concealment lies not in protecting our secret truths, but in hiding from us the truths of others. The dark protects us from what we dare not know.

Callum knows now that his true fear is not a dragon. Because his real fear in a universe where even stars can burn out, is that his best will never be quite good enough. 

There’s nowhere left to run, no time. There’s a click at the door beside him. 

The dragon whispers. Reminding him of everything he has to lose, everything he  _ will lose- _

“Was it you?” 

If words could be knives, Callum knows his heart would be sliced open now. He feels a twinge in his heart, a reminder that soon- despite everything- it will be just him and his dragon. Alone. 

Callum looks his dragon in the eye and lets the words tumble from his mouth, finally freeing himself of the chains he built onto himself. 

This story has happened. There is nothing to be done to change it. It is a story of love and loss, betrayal, courage and sacrifice. It is a story of the blurred line between our best and our very worst. The night is falling and the line is still twisted into infinity. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! So this is the first fanfic I've ever posted so hopefully its good enough for some kudos :) I have written many stories before, but been too much of a coward to post them - guess I got my own dragon to face. 
> 
> Some of this was inspired by one of the most tragic books I've read (Revenge Of the Sith Novel) as it describes fear so amazingly. 
> 
> I must state- I do not believe Cal needs to be more of a man, that's just his own thought process from years of living under Jonno. I really feel for Callum right now because he has no options left and he really doesn't want to lose Ben or see any of his family hurt. While he's made some stupid decision, its all been to protect Ben from being hurt or from hurting other people, and I don't think many of us would of handled this situation better than him as while we know Ben would shoot his dad for him, Cal does not. (Hurry up EE and let that man know!)
> 
> Come talk to me on twitter @/jedizula :)


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